


Lousy

by JoJo



Category: Starsky & Hutch
Genre: Episode Related, Gen, s03e23 Deckwatch
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-09-08
Updated: 2011-09-08
Packaged: 2017-10-23 13:13:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,360
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/250675
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JoJo/pseuds/JoJo
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>Starsky had asked what was the matter -- although on reflection it was a stupid question. Hutch had been on the skids way before they were presented with Madeleine. Way before multiple knife wounds peppered his fragile psyche with grapeshot.</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	Lousy

**Author's Note:**

> written to try and explain Hutch's moodiness in this ep - if anyone ever asks me if I have a favourite among my own S&H pieces (which luckily they don't), this would be it :)

The smell of canal water in the heat got Starsky right in the back of the throat. He wanted to hack it up and spit it out. Even better, hack up the whole of the day and just be rid of it.

Dobey opened the cab door as he braked at kerbside.

"He's in," Starsky said.

"You got a plan?" asked the Captain.

"Yup."

"Hutch know the plan?"

"Yup."

"Tell me the everloving plan, Starsky!"

Starsky drew his gun, flipped the chamber open to check, flipped it shut and re-holstered it. "Playing it by ear," he said.  
Staring into the dark glass that hid all the answers, Dobey learnt nothing more. Starsky was gone before he knew it, scooting across the grass, and streaking in between two houses that would take him out back of Hannah's.

*

Starsky felt the weight on his shoulders alright, when he got over the fence and found the back door locked.

He took brief stock. One old lady in a wheelchair. One flaky ex-girlfriend. One bleeding lunatic with a knife habit. Oh, um... and one partner heading South without a suitcase.

 _Hunting down a wounded felon._

That was certainly lousy. Hutch had served the comment to his partner with the same accusatory kickback he'd been finding all day long.

 _Being dead._

Undeniably lousy too. Starsky's unplayable return had reduced Hutch to just a look, full of pent-up fury that he wouldn't be able to help himself to anymore pickings.

Take, take, take. The more his partner gave, the more Hutch took, snapping at the offerings like an animal with its leg in a trap, ungrateful and defensive.

Starsky had asked what was the matter -- although on reflection it was a stupid question. Hutch had been on the skids way before they were presented with Madeleine. Way before multiple knife wounds peppered his fragile psyche with grapeshot. So then he had tried being supportive when Dobey wouldn't go for two hours... supportive but practical, putting in a bid for one hour. Had to be as calm and unemotional as he could manage to try and direct Hutch away from reckless heroics in the dark. Figured that asking Hutch what he thought might show him he didn't have to be so out there all alone, so pissed at the world.

But Hutch had never been good at making an honest peace when his head was full of mess -- Vanessa could have told anyone that -- and he would seek mindless revenge, inflicting damage when he got the chance. He let the mess out gradually, bit by bit, one painful remark at a time, not differentiating between recipients.

Starsky was the one who could soak up large amounts of ill-humor without reaction, and then turn it to some advantage. He had done it for years with his brother, and he had continued to do it whenever his partner hit the overload barrier at speed. Today he'd sat behind his dark glasses and sucked it all in, even as it was coming at him in waves. When every question and remark got slapped right back at him he took on oxygen and trod water.

"OK, I'll play it by ear," he said when they were in the cab. It was what he had been doing since Hutch had arrived in the squadroom that morning ready to maul whoever was closest. Whoever was wearing the sign round their neck that read 'Bite Head Off Here'.

Starsky didn't need long to gage what was wrong. Not so much a case of the blues... more a case of going down like a ninepin before the onslaught of life. And having been put in the firing line by virtue of just being himself, the only solution Starsky could come up with was to take it all on the chin.

Tried one more time, watching his partner's fussy fingers taping the gun below his knee-cap.

"You OK?"

The head snapped up, the eyes suspicious. Starsky saw the smallest of hint of self-awareness scurry across the familiar features. The smallest recognition of being in a truly parlous state and needing a major rescue. It was followed by an attempt at a smile, which largely failed.

"I'll tell you in an hour."

*

It was kind of fitting that, on this deeply skewed day, things took a turn for the worse while he was hanging off a stairpost by his fingertips.

When Starsky heard Hector demanding the gun he decided that Hutch had fumbled it, which was frankly no surprise. He'd gone and taped the thing down too tight, much too tight for fingers numbed by temporary madness...

Starsky held his pose for a few seconds, breath hitching in his diaphragm, and then dropped. His feet hit the floor lightly.

Hutch was full length. He seemed to feel the vibration and turned his head to the mirror.

Starsky hoped his little nod was going to hit his partner right between the eyes, give him the first positive emotion of the day.

 _Here I am. You can give the psycho the gun now. Let it go, Hutch, I've got your back._

*

The deck had fallen right out from under Hector before the hour was up.

As white noise evidently rushed through his head, he decided his final act would be to take the three of them with him before the cop's back-up arrived. It never seemed to occur to him that the cop's back-up was only ten feet away.

Starsky passed the incoming officers on the front steps and went to sit in a squadcar to nurse the icicle embedded in his chest. As dusk crept into darkness he watched as two real paramedics came out with a covered gurney. The radio crackled but it wasn't for him.

Dobey went in and out, wandered over to tell him it was a good job, and then wandered away again. Lights came on in Hannah's house.

Hutch appeared on the steps in his blood-spattered tunic, inhaled some evening air and came down to him.

"Laura OK?" Starsky asked, although it was not the question that most occurred to him, seeing as Hutch looked like he'd just puked up or was just about to.

"She will be."

"Hannah?"

"Hannah's always OK."

Starsky let it go four beats. "You OK?" Third time today. _Do your worst, Blintz. I can take it._

"Fair to middling."

"Maybe you should think about dating Laura again."

Hutch looked across at the house. "You reckon?"

"It'd give you someone else's chops to bust."

"More likely she'd bust mine."

"Well... even that could be good."

Hutch stretched out, reaching towards the sky. "I'm going back in." Starsky tried a half smile, the type designed to hold the utter wretchedness of life at bay, when Hutch let it. Hutch just frowned at him. "You need to go home and get some rest," he said. "You look like someone's been busting your chops all day."

The body language, weaving and insecure all the way back up to the door, told Starsky there was still some way to go.

But at least it wasn't Hutch who'd delivered four bullets through the back of a chair today. Instead he'd been the one who fixed Hector up and offered a way out, which was the right thing to do. Starsky was the one with no deals on offer, the one who took Hector down with clinical competence, which was the only thing to do.

 _Killed a man today. Unsighted and off balance, but boy did I hit the target._

The icicle twisted and Starsky had to remind himself that, between them, they'd ensured Hector wouldn't make landfall again. Which in turn meant that someone else wouldn't die.

 _Sooner or later that thought's going to come to you and things won't seem so bad, Hutch. Things won't seem so lousy._

Which, by Starsky's calculation, was going to be about the time when the pendulum would have swung back in his direction, and pole-axed him with a gutful of beer and whisky chasers.

And then Hutch would be there in the night, without even being called, to come and gently peel him off his bathroom floor.


End file.
